If you have never seen this film add it to your list of ones to get. After nearly 35 years this made for television film remains one of the most powerful well-made films about the life of black America in the South from Civil War days, through reconstruction, KKK, and civil rights protests of the 1960s. It is an acting tour de force by Cicely Tyson, and has other excellent performances as well.
One of the things I found particularly interesting was its portrayal of southern whites as more pathetic than evil. There is a sense that the whites, even the most viciously brutal, were motivated by a desire to maintain their way of life, rather than pure evil and mindless hatred. In one scene, the young Ticey/Jane (wonderfully played by Valerie Odell) and Little Ned are on a lengthy trek towards Ohio after gaining freedom at the end of the Civil War due to the Emancipation Proclamation. They stop at a the gate to a property and a white woman gives them water, although she hates them and their kind and won't let their lips defile her drinking cup.
One of the things I found particularly interesting was its portrayal of southern whites as more pathetic than evil. There is a sense that the whites, even the most viciously brutal, were motivated by a desire to maintain their way of life, rather than pure evil and mindless hatred. In one scene, the young Ticey/Jane (wonderfully played by Valerie Odell) and Little Ned are on a lengthy trek towards Ohio after gaining freedom at the end of the Civil War due to the Emancipation Proclamation. They stop at a the gate to a property and a white woman gives them water, although she hates them and their kind and won't let their lips defile her drinking cup.